


"I thought it happened to everyone?"

by HoransPayne



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-07-26
Updated: 2018-07-17
Packaged: 2018-07-26 21:15:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 10
Words: 20,070
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7590628
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HoransPayne/pseuds/HoransPayne
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“Do we know who this is?” He questioned Scott without removing his gaze from the screen.</p><p>“Name’s Liam Payne.” Niall didn’t have to look at Scott to know he was trying to hold back a smirk. “The Liam Payne, Nialler. Big time popstar!” Niall threw Scott a pointed look, as if to remind him of the serious matter at hand.</p><p>“Liam Payne?” Niall repeated. “From One Direction?” He recalled the boy band he’d heard plenty of times on the radio.</p><p>Scott nodded. “The one and only."</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. All Niall could manage to do was curse: “Shit!”

Niall liked to think he lived a pretty good life. He had a good job that paid well and was really exciting, he had a good number of close friends, and he had a pretty good family life. Niall lived alone in a flat in London. The flat was average sized, two bedrooms and a living room combined with a kitchen. He had a good amount of space to move around and do how he pleased. Although he lived alone, he was most certainly not lonely. Niall’s friends regularly hung around at his flat, or he went to theirs, or they went to the pub, doing regular things men in their early twenties did: drank beer, watched football and tried to flirt with women. His family also visited every few months from Ireland, and he made sure to go back home to Mullingar every Christmas.

By far, in Niall’s opinion, the best part of his life was his job. It was fair to say Niall had his dream job. All through his childhood Niall wanted to be a police officer; as a child he loved playing cops and robbers, and he loved all those TV shows about the police and detectives. Niall had worked to be a police officer his whole life, and what he had now was even better. He’d attended university in London where he studied psychology, and straight out of university he obtained a job in the police force. Now he was a detective, head of his department, with his own office and everything. Niall was still quite young, being in his early twenties, and many were extremely impressed by how quickly he’d ascended the ladder of success, but Niall was good at his job and he worked extremely hard for it. His experiences with psychology allowed him to not only delve into the possible thoughts of the criminals, but also those of their victims and so this helped him a lot when questioning people. 

It seemed that Niall had everything going for him. The only downside was how his work tended to affect him mentally. His department’s main focus was kidnapping cases all over the United Kingdom, not just in London. When in the middle of a particularly heated case, he would lose countless hours of sleep because his mind would constantly be in a state of overdrive. He always tried his hardest not to get too emotionally invested into his cases, but he couldn’t help it; it was just in his true nature. The children were always the hardest; he would sometimes find himself lurching awake in the middle of the night, their high pitched cries echoing around his mind. Ever since becoming the head of his department, Niall had been involved in around ten different kidnapping cases, six of which involved people under the age of eighteen. Luckily for the victims, and for his mental stability, he’d been successful in each of these cases. There were a few close calls, which still haunt Niall’s nightmares with the thoughts of what might’ve been, but he was always able to nurse himself back to sleep with the thoughts that they were now home, alive and safe. 

Despite all this, Niall had no doubt in his mind, looking back on it now, that his worst case was yet to come. It all began on what seemed like a typical Thursday morning. It was mid May, however you wouldn't think so if you looked outside. After turning off his alarm, Niall pulled open his blinds and saw that all of the sky was masked in grey. The clouds hung heavy over the north London skyline, where his flat was situated. The pavement below remembered the memory of rain from the previous night, and Niall sighed. In retrospect it almost seemed like some sort of pathetic fallacy was being emanated, warning him about what was to come. However, at the time he thought nothing of it. Living in the United Kingdom you get used to rain, no matter whether it was summer or winter. Niall continued on with his normal morning routine: breakfast of coffee and cereal, brushing his teeth, and dressing in a button-down shirt and black trousers. Because he wasn't exactly a police officer, he had no requirement to wear a uniform as long as he dressed somewhat smartly. He pulled on his long coat and tied his shoes and was set to go. Taking one last glance at the light drizzle now falling outside his window, he chose to grab his umbrella on the way out before leaving for the tube station. 

As always, Niall arrived before half past eight, much earlier than required, but he quite liked the peace coming in this early granted him; it helped relax his mind and get him settled for the day ahead. He was under the impression that his day would be filled with nothing more than writing up some paperwork for a previous case he'd just completed. Niall’s department headquarters lay just further north of his flat. It was a particularly sizeable building, considering it was only his department that inhabited it. The building was quite new, so had a modern look to it. The main infrastructure consisted of large, light brown bricks that framed large, glass windows. The entryway was made up of a cylindrical column of glass, which allowed the waiting room to be illuminated by a cheerful, natural light. Said waiting room contained a number of chairs lined up against the walls and another row parallel to these in front of them. In the centre of the room was a desk where the secretary worked. Because Niall arrived so early, the secretary, nor anyone else, had arrived yet, so it was his duty to unlock the large glass doors. He paid little attention to the waiting room, barely passing a glance as he crossed the room and unlocked the door that lay next to the secretary’s desk, which allowed him access to the rest of the building. On the other side of the door there was a large round room, filled with various numbers of desks topped with computers. This was where the main members of Niall’s team worked. The array of desks was almost enclosed in a dome, as the floor they stood upon was lowered. This allowed Niall’s office to take precedence at the back of the room on the still raised area of the floor. Either side of Niall as he stepped through the door was a long corridor leading to various other areas of the building. He headed straight for his office, marked by the plaque on the door stating: “Niall Horan”. It was a good sized room, containing a desk similar to the ones everyone else had with a computer resting on top. The desk lay at the back of the room, which meant that, thanks to the glass windows, he could see out into the other room when sitting down. There was a small, black couch opposite his desk, against the wall which held the door. There were a few metal cabinets either side of Niall's desk, against the back wall, containing important files from previous cases. The windowed walls were lined with blinds for added privacy when needed. Niall opted to keep them open for the time being and sat at his desk. 

As Niall typed up his latest case report the rest of his team slowly trailed in. The few without paperwork to do chose to congregate in the break room, which you could find by walking slightly left down the corridor. He was used to the low buzz of chatter which typically followed the arrival of his team, so he never looked up from his computer until he heard a light knock at the door. The person on the other side didn't wait for a response before entering the office. Niall looked up to see a tall, slim built man with light brown hair and two mugs in his hand. His growing smile faltered when he saw the unusually solemn look on the man's face.  
"What's up, Scott?" He saved his work and closed the file, knowing the possibility of a quiet day in the office was minimal now. Scott sighed placed both mugs down, and dramatically flopped into the chair on the opposite side of the desk. 

"You haven't seen already?" The look he gave Niall was a skeptical one. 

"Seen what?" Scott chose to ignore his question at first and opted to pushing one of the steaming mugs towards the other man. 

"I brought you some coffee." Scott picked up the second mug and took a long swig of the liquid steaming out of it. 

"Thanks, but I already had some this morning." Niall leaned forward in his chair. "Scott, what's going on?" Scott stared at him for a moment, and then breathed what seemed like a whole lungful of air out of his mouth. Niall had to stop himself rolling his eyes at his ability to dramatise every situation. 

"Trust me Nialler, you're gonna need the coffee after I show you this." He rose from his chair and walked so he was now stood next to Niall, then leaned over him to access his computer. He typed something into a search engine, Niall didn't see exactly what, and the page that came up was black. There was the sudden sound of a switch being turned on and a whirring noise echoed through the computer speakers. The once black screen was lit up, showing a small room, with walls of grey concrete. A single light hung from the ceiling, illuminating the small room, and Niall noted the absence of windows. In the very centre of both the room, and the screen, stood a chair.

'Steel', Niall thought, 'definitely not comfortable.' 

However, his main concern was not the absence of windows, or how comfortable the chair was. No, in fact, Niall's number one concern was the man in the room, sitting in that chair. He was clearly struggling against whatever it was that seemed to be binding him to the chair.

All Niall could manage to do was curse: “Shit!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you very much for reading the first chapter of this story. This is my first ever Niam fanfic, and I've had this first chapter written for a while, so I've been quite excited to post it. I hope you enjoyed reading. I have the second chapter written up already, but I don't want to post them both at once; so that should be uploaded in about a week or so. Thanks again for your time. :)  
> (Also, if any of you have a Tumblr give me a shout at horanspayne! :D)


	2. Scott nodded. “The one and only.”

Niall ran his hands through his short, dyed blond hair and sighed. There go his plans for a restful, boring day of paperwork. Niall and his team rarely had chance to do their paperwork in office hours, most favouring the option to take their work home with them instead of staying overtime at the office. Niall reached forward for his coffee and took a long swig, knowing now that he would need to be on full alert today. Scott laughed at this.

“What did I tell you Nialler?” Niall did roll his eyes this time. He turned his eyes back towards the screen and focused his gaze onto the man tied to the chair. He was pulling against what Niall now realised were ropes, tying him tightly in place. His face was scrunched up from the sheer effort he was putting into the unlikely task of freeing himself. Niall squinted at the screen, trying to get a better view of the man he was sure that he recognised.

“Do we know who this is?” He questioned Scott without removing his gaze from the screen.

“Name’s Liam Payne.” Niall didn’t have to look at Scott to know he was trying to hold back a smirk. “The Liam Payne, Nialler. Big time popstar!” Niall threw Scott a pointed look, as if to remind him of the serious matter at hand.

“Liam Payne?” Niall repeated. “From One Direction?” He recalled the boy band he’d heard plenty of times on the radio.

Scott nodded. “The one and only.”

“Alright. Fill me in on everything you know.” Niall decided to turn off the monitor at this point, finding his attention was strongly attracted to it at the moment, but knowing that whatever Scott was about to tell him needed his full focus. He turned his gaze to look at Scott, who was still stood over him whilst leaning both arms onto Niall’s desk beside him. Niall and Scott had known each other for years. They went to school together back in Ireland, but weren’t necessarily friends with each other. Scott was two years older than Niall, and so the two only knew each other in passing, maybe sharing a word or two here and there, but nothing major. When Niall joined the police force, Scott had been right there with him and they became fast friends. Niall considered Scott to be his best friend, and his partner. Technically speaking, Niall was Scott’s boss, but everyone on the team knew that, although Scott was not officially higher in command than them, whatever he said went, unless contradicted otherwise by Niall himself. Niall saw Scott as the most talented member of his team, and so usually pulled Scott into his office to pick his brain when particularly stuck on a case. Scott also tended to be the one people came to with special requests for the assistance of Niall and his team. He would analyse each case and decide which held more importance than others, and so deserved their specialist attention. Scott wasted no time filling Niall in with the details of this current case, and they were the same words Niall later echoed to the rest of his team that he had gather in the meeting room shortly after:

“Liam Payne, twenty four years old, international pop sensation,” Niall began, examining the room to ensure he had everyone’s full attention. “I’m sure a number of you may know of him already; or at least the band he’s in: One Direction. In the late hours of last night this new website was created.” Niall turned to the whiteboard which was now had a search engine projected onto it. Scott, taking this as his cue, typed the same website name into the search engine and the screen was engulfed in the darkness of the webpage again. Just like before, the video of the man, now known to be Liam Payne, appeared on the screen. He was still struggling against the ropes, the distress clearly showing on his face and evident in his cries for help croaking out of him. “This video footage is live,” Niall continued, “we don’t know where he is, why he is there, or who put him there. All we currently know is that whoever it is, is a narcissistic sadist who wants the world to know what they’re capable of. They have access to all of Payne’s social media accounts, and have posted the link to this webpage to all said accounts to ensure it gets as much attention as possible. Payne has millions of followers on all his social media platforms; whoever has taken him wants people to see the torture that he is sure to suffer.” Niall could sense the discomfort in the room. They all knew that the type of person they were dealing with that kidnapped this man was surely a dangerous one. “Now, because this case is so new, we know very little on it currently. I need you lot to gather as much information as possible, and as fast as possible. We don’t currently know what the person that has kidnapped Payne wants; they may possibly just get off on knowing they’re going to cause a lot of harm with this, not only to Payne but also to his family, friends, and millions of fans.” Niall shifted his gaze quickly to Scott, which he knew meant that Niall wanted him to get rid of the video. “This is what I want to happen,” Niall walked in front of the whiteboard, once again examining the room to ensure all eyes were on him, pens at the ready, “I need you to split up into your usual teams. I need the Victimology Team to learn as much about Liam Payne as you can. Speak to his parents, any siblings he might have, his bandmates and any other friends he has. Find out what he gets up to in his free time, find out what he was doing before he was taken, who was the last person to see him, when was he taken, who he might have upset enough to do this to him. As soon as you find out any information on his whereabouts before he was taken, let the Tech Team know so they can get any footage from security cameras to see if we can find anything out from that. Once you get in contact with his family and friends, see who you can get to come here so they can be interviewed personally by either myself or Scott.” Niall nodded in said man’s direction, and paused for a moment as he watched the members of the Victimology Team scribble down their notes on what he was saying. He couldn’t help feeling quite flustered. He knew the pressure that came with high profile cases like these. The fact Liam was famous was definitely going to make this case much more difficult, what with the high levels of attention they’d get in the press, and from his fans; not to mention the fact a live stream of his capture was on the internet for everyone to see. He ran his hands through his hair and took a deep breath before looking back to his team, who were watching him expectantly. “Alright, I want the Tech Team to see if they can get any trace from the IP address of the website. Any little thing would be great, no matter how small it may seem, because at the moment we have nothing. We also need at least one of you watching the stream at all times, and noting down anything of importance. Rotate every hour or so, and see if you can find some way to download the stream so we can look back on it later on if needed. Until we find out more, there isn’t much anyone else can do. Anyone not on the Victimology or Tech Teams can finish up any paperwork they may have because there’s definitely no way you’ll get a chance to do it later. Anyone with no paperwork to do, if you could give some assistance to the Victimology Team it’d be greatly appreciated. We need all hands on deck people, get moving!” He clapped his hands in a way to spur on the team as they all rose to their feet, excluding Victimology, who’d be using the meeting room to lay out their ideas. 

Niall decided it’d be best to give them a while to do this on their own, without their boss hanging over them, so he walked back to his office. He switched the monitor of his computer on in the hope that he, too, might be able to get some more paperwork done, but these thoughts quickly fled from his mind once he saw the video was still playing. The man was no longer fighting against his restraints, clearly having tired himself out. The look on his face reflected this, and it was so downhearted and almost pathetic that Niall’s heart hurt for him. Both Niall and Liam were visibly startled at the sudden banging of the door opening, and a large figure entering the room.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks again for reading. I'd also like to say a huge thank you to those that left kudos and to the people that took the time to leave comments; it's really sweet of you and means a lot. I hope you enjoyed the second chapter of my story :)
> 
> Once again, you can find me @ horanspayne on Tumblr if you'd like!


	3. "Why are you wearing a mask?"

Said figure belonged to what Niall could identify as a man, dressed in long black trousers, a black jumper, and a black mask. Niall would've rolled his eyes if it wasn't for the severity of the situation; if he had a pound for every time he'd seen an outfit like that in his years of work for the police, he'd be a rich man. Liam looked at the man with confusion, eyebrows furrowed over his squinting eyes. It was when Liam spoke up that Niall was thankful for the quality of the camera and the microphone his apparent kidnapper was using. He noted in a small notepad he kept that it meant he most likely had a good sum of money to his name somehow, or he'd stolen it off Liam.

"Why are you wearing a mask?" Liam's voice was strained; it sounded as if he'd made his throat somewhat sore whilst crying for help.

"Because Liam," The man enunciated each word perfectly, speaking slowly. Niall scribbled down in his notes that the man quite clearly enjoyed knowing he had an audience watching him, "we can't have people knowing what I look like now, can we?" Based on Liam's reaction, Niall could conclude that, as of the present moment, he was ignorant to the fact he was on camera. Although his confusion was apparent, he didn't voice the questions that were clearly running through his mind. He remained silent as the unknown man stalked around his chair, sizing him up like a predator selecting his prey. Upon completion of his circle around the chair, he stepped closer to Liam. He lifted Liam's lowered head so they were eye to eye, and used his other hand to push his hair from his face. It looked almost as if he was caressing the young man, and Niall was quite taken aback by the gentleness of his actions all of a sudden. 

Niall had been involved in cases before where the captor was gentle with their victim. It showed a level of care, a level of familiarity with the victim. He'd seen it a number of times when children had been kidnapped by a neighbour, or a family friend that they'd been in firsthand contact with. He'd also seen it in cases where the victim had been stalked for a long time by their captor before they were kidnapped. However, it caught Niall off guard because the man had started so aggressively, barging in the room and behaving in a rather animalistic fashion. He decided that whoever had taken Liam either knew him personally, or was at least a huge fan of his, perhaps so huge that he had stalked him on a few occasions. He also decided that he was probably pretty unstable mentally. He wrote this, too, into his little notebook.

Niall kept a notebook on him at all times when working a case. He made sure Scott, and the rest of his team, did the same. They would then have a daily summary meeting before they finished for the day to go over everything they'd done that day. It just made things easier, in Niall's opinion, because it helped bring together each individual piece of the puzzle before he could see the final picture.

The man stared at Liam for a while, and Niall could see that the young man was struggling to hold his gaze. 

"Liam, I want to lay out a few rules for you." He didn't move from Liam's face at all, so he was speaking directly in front of him. Niall hoped for Liam's sake that his breath didn't stink. He spoke softly to him, similar to the way in which you'd speak to a child. "You must only speak when spoken to. When speaking to me you will call me ‘Sir’, nothing else. I don't want to hear anymore of your cries for help, so you better stop that right now. When alone in this room, you will sit in silence and look straight at the wall in front of you. I want you to have plenty of time to think about what you've done. Do you understand?" Liam had been silent for the entirety of the man's speech. He nodded to show his cooperation. This earned him a large blow to the face. The man had struck him, hard, with his right hand. Liam yelped in pain. The man grabbed his hair tightly with his left hand and pulled on it to keep Liam's face level with his. "You will answer me properly when I ask you a question!" The soft voice from before had certainly faded quickly, to be replaced by a loud, booming one, that gave Niall shivers even from the comfort of his own office. Liam received another hard strike to the face before he was asked: "Is that understood?"

"Y-yes, sir. Sorry, sir." He tried to lower his head in defeat, but it was still being held up by the man's grasp in his hair.

"Much better." The man released his tight grip on him, and held his face just as tenderly as before, his voice also returning to a much more soothing tone. "Liam, you know I don't like having to do that to you, but you must learn to behave." He then walked out of the room, his aggression from before seemed impossible in comparison to the gentle demeanour he had whilst exiting the room, leaving a quietly sobbing Liam alone again.

"Okay," Niall thought to himself. "Definitely mentally unstable."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading and a huge thanks to the people bookmarking, leaving kudos, and commenting; it's really sweet. Hope you enjoy!  
> Give us a shout on Tumblr @ horanspayne if you'd like :)


	4. “Alright, Nialler! So, what now?”

Niall stared at the screen blankly, the faint sobbing of Liam in the background. Niall dreaded the day that he would become so sensitised to such acts of violence and torment that he wouldn't react, so he was, in a way, quite thankful for how sick he was feeling now. He was rather grateful when Scott knocked on his door, giving him an excuse to turn the monitor off, and thus blocking out the sounds of Liam trying to comfort himself, for fear of what might happen if he cried too loudly. 

"What's up, Scott?" Scott had a very grave look on his face, similar to the one he wore earlier that morning before he told Niall about the video. It didn't fill him with much hope that Scott may have possibly been bearing good news.

"The lads parents have been brought in. You really need to talk to them." Niall didn't doubt this for a moment. He was much more able to empathise with families than Scott, not that Scott couldn't empathise with people, he just preferred not to be around people that couldn't contain their emotions; Niall was his one exception, and it had taken him long enough to break his walls. 

Niall exited his office, following Scott who was leading him in the direction of the waiting room. Niall heard Liam's parents long before he saw them; well, he heard his mother. He was greeted by man and a woman. The man was taller than his wife, with short greying hair that had the remnants of some darker coloured hairs, reminding people of how it once looked in his youth. In his arms he held a woman. Niall could only see that she had short, blonde hair, perhaps dyed like his own. The rest of her was buried into the man's loving embrace, holding her as she bawled into his chest. Neither seemed very aware of neither Niall nor Scott's presence, so Scott loudly cleared his throat causing the man to look up.

"Mr and Mrs Payne, I'd like you to meet my boss, and the head detective working your son's case." Scott gestured in Niall's direction. Mr Payne nodded in response, and looked down to the woman in his arms.

"Karen," he spoke rather softly as he rubbed his hands up and down her arms. Niall's heart was warmed by the evident love between the two of them. Upon hearing her husband's voice, Mrs Payne tried to control herself and pulled some tissues from her pocket. "The detectives are here to speak to us now." At this, she turned around to face Niall and Scott, and Niall took in how red her eyes and face were.

'No wonder Scott came to get me,' he thought. Mrs Payne was, as expected, very emotional, but it's not something Scott enjoys. He doesn't like dealing with crying families so Niall, who is much more sensitive and caring, quite often would take over for him, despite the fact they'd get sent to Scott first.

"It's very nice to meet you, Mr and Mrs Payne. I'm Niall Horan." He extended his hand towards the couple and gave them a soft smile as they took his hand, Mr Payne's strong grip first, followed by Mrs Payne's half-hearted handshake. "Would you like to come sit in my office and we can have a chat?" Neither spoke up, but it wasn't as if they were going to refuse. Niall spun around and slowly led them to his office, his usually bouncy walk being toned down now, as if to show respect. It also, Niall had learnt, reassured families that, despite his young age, he would be taking the case seriously. He'd had a few families doubt his capabilities and demand a new detective to work the case, but they soon realised after speaking to Niall that he was just as good, if not better, than someone older.

Niall sat the couple down in the chairs across from his desk, one had to be dragged in from elsewhere, whilst Niall sat opposite them in his own chair. Scott had left them alone to talk after bringing the parents tea, and helping Niall set up the camera. Niall had to explain to the couple that they filmed everything in case his notes were damaged or they needed to use it as evidence later on. 

"When was the last time you saw your son, Mr and Mrs Payne?" Now the formalities were over, Niall wanted to get on with the case straight away, and where better to start than the beginning?

"He came back from tour just over a month ago, we had dinner with him the week after and we haven't seen him in person since." Mr Payne was the one who responded, his wife seemingly too distraught to make any noise except the occasional sniff now and then. 

“Was that the last time you spoke to him altogether, or have you been in contact with him at all since?”

“I mean, obviously we call him.” Mr Payne was quite short with him, his voice quickly rising, and his temper seemingly ready to blow. “I don’t really see how any of this is relevant to finding our son at all.” Niall understood that for families it is a highly stressful time, and people deal with this stress in many different ways. The Paynes were quite a typical couple in their reactions thus far, in Niall’s opinion, with Mrs Payne crying quietly and Mr Payne getting angry – this was a reaction Niall had seen before, and would definitely be seeing again.

“You see sir, we need to know as much as possible about your son. Any detail you give us about him, no matter how small it may seem to you, could possibly end up being crucial to us.” Niall tried to calmly explain this to Liam’s father, desperate to ease the rising tension in the room.

“And how is you knowing I text my son important in any way?” Niall could see the blood enter the man’s face, his stern expression being highlighted by the red colour seeping into his cheeks.

“Well, perhaps he texted you something about a person in his life, or something that may have happened to him that you may have brushed off, but could actually be quite important to us in finding whoever did this.”

“Are you trying to insult our parenting? You think we don’t care about our son?” His voice had reached the level of a shout by this point, making both Niall and his wife flinch due to his booming voice.

“N-no, sir. I would never – “

“I won’t sit here and be insulted by a child like this!” He rose from his chair, making it screech across the floor. His wife sat solemnly watching him as he strode towards Niall’s office door and tugged it open. Niall quickly stood up to follow him.

“Sir! Where are you going?” He desperately called after the figure of Liam’s father which was making its way down the corridor. Scott suddenly appeared before him, clearly hearing the commotion; it’s not like Mr Payne was trying to be subtle.

“Sir, please return to your seat.” Niall cringed inside. He was nervous to see if he could actually do any good in resolving this matter, or whether he would just add fuel to the fire that was Mr Payne. 

“I refuse to be questioned by this child any longer! How can we trust him to find our son when he’s probably still living with his parents?” Mrs Payne’s quiet sniffles had escalated into actual tears now as she wept into a scrunched up piece of tissue she held tightly in her hands, clearly upset by her husband’s actions.

“Would you like to speak to somebody older, sir?” Niall was amazed by Scott’s calm approach to Liam’s father. Scott was good at questioning criminals, or suspected criminals, but typically never the families. “Niall, can we get Jenkins to talk to Mr and Mrs Payne?” This suggestion had Niall almost jumping towards the phone that lay atop his desk. Timothy Jenkins was the oldest member of Niall’s team. He typically looked after the youngsters when they first came to work for them; he helped them settle in and train them to the best of their abilities. He had done exactly that for both Scott and Niall, and was known to the team as Grandpa Jenkins. Because he was so much older, the families that hesitated to talk to Niall due to his youth tended to open up to Jenkins. In five minutes Niall had him in his office, calmly leading Mr and Mrs Payne towards his own office.

“Well, that was exciting!” Scott had a real tendency to make stupid jokes at inappropriate times, which earned him a light punch in the arm from Niall. He had retreated back to his seat at his desk once the Paynes had been taken away, and Scott was now sitting across from him, in Mr Payne’s recently vacated seat. 

“Alright, Nialler! So, what now?”

Niall leant his hands on his desk and pushed his chair backwards so the two front legs were raised off the ground. He sighed deeply and was just about to tell Scott he had no idea what to do next when the ringing of his phone stopped him. He placed his chair back down, raised his eyebrows at Scott and picked it up. 

"Hello, this is Niall Horan." He answered in the most professional tone he could muster despite his exasperation. 

"Yeah, hi." The voice on the other side of the line sounded like a man's, and he seemed slightly unsure in his words. "I got a voicemail on my phone telling me to come visit and to ring this number to tell you I'm on my way." His accent sounded like one from the northern area of England, but Niall being Irish meant he wasn't sure exactly where. 

"What's your name?"

"Er, it's Louis." He paused, and then added: "Tomlinson." Niall thought he perhaps recognised the name, but couldn't pinpoint where. Thankfully, due to the silence from Niall's end Louis decided to add: "I'm in the same band as Liam Payne. I got a call about an interview, so me and Harry are on our way now."

"Oh, of course sir, my apologies." Niall was quick to reassure the man, doing his best to avoid another outburst like the one Mr Payne had had. 

"No worries mate, we should be there in about..." There was a slight pause before he spoke up again. "Ten minutes, I think." 

"Okay, sir. See you soon." With a short "bye" from Louis, Niall hung up the phone and looked at Scott. 

"Well, lad, seems like your question's been answered for me." Scott looked back at him, confusion written clearly on his face. "Liam Payne's band mates are on their way for an interview now."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As always, thanks a bunch for reading and an extra special thank you to the people leaving kudos, commenting and bookmarking - it means the world that you take the time to interact with this fic and I hope you know I really do appreciate it. Hope you enjoy!
> 
> As always, my Tumblr is @ horanspayne


	5. “Aren’t you a little young to be havin’ a job like this?”

Niall and Scott were sat patiently in the former's office, waiting for the two young men to arrive. They'd pulled in two more chairs from elsewhere, and placed one next to Niall's, where Scott would be seated, and one opposite, so both men could sit opposite them. Scott was currently sat across from Niall, as the two were involved in some light small talk to ease the tension that had built in the room whilst they waited. He quickly rose from the seat however at the sound of a knock on Niall's door. Niall, too, rose from his seat as he walked to open the door, greeted by the friendly, young face of the secretary, Jane. 

"Mr. Horan, I have a Mr. Louis Tomlinson and Mr. Harry Styles to see you." She stood to one side putting the two men in clear view of Niall. The one Jane pointed out as Louis was at least a couple inches shorter than the other. Both had brown hair, Harry’s perhaps slightly darker, and much longer, which fell to his shoulders in curled ringlets. Louis’ was shorter, and framed his face, and Niall wondered if it was as soft to touch as it looked. Both men were rather slender, and both wore looks of concern on their faces, understandably so. Niall gave them a small smile, hoping to ease their nerves, as he offered his hand for them to shake. Louis’ handshake turned out to be much firmer than Niall expected, and Harry’s a lot softer.

“It’s nice to meet you gentleman, would you like to sit down?” Niall stepped back into his office and gestured towards the chairs, one of which Scott had recently vacated. They both followed him inside, whilst Scott closed the door behind them. Once all four were seated, and the camera rolling, Niall decided to begin.  
“Alright, so my name is Niall Horan. It was me you spoke to on the phone.” Niall’s eyes were on Louis’ blue ones as he said this. “I am the head detective on your band mate’s case. This here is Scott Matthews, he is part of the brilliant team I have doing everything possible to find your friend.” Niall had found it better to describe his team in this way. Not to brag, but to try and reassure people that their loved one was in the best hands possible.

“Aren’t you a little young to be havin’ a job like this?” Louis’ accent seemed stronger than it was on the phone, his words lacking the letters ‘t’ and ‘g’. Niall’s heart sank. Jenkins was already busy with Liam’s parents; he couldn’t possibly turn his band mates over to him too.

“I wouldn’t worry about Niall’s age; your mate is in capable hands.” Scott chose this moment to speak up for the first time since the men arrived and Niall wasn’t sure whether he should be grateful for his comment or not.

“Don’t worry, mate. I wasn’t tryna’ question his capabilities or anythin’.” Niall breathed a sigh of relief at this comment. “Was just surprised, is all.”

“Anyway, my age aside, shall we get down to business?” Niall wanted to get some sort of lead on this case before the day ended, and although it wasn’t even lunch time yet, he was feeling a little desperate. “When was the last time either of you saw Liam in person?”

“Er, we came back from tour about a month ago,” Louis began, echoing the words of Liam’s parents, “and we haven’t really seen much of him since.” He shrugged his shoulders and looked over to Harry, who hadn’t contributed to the conversation at all yet. “We’re takin’ a bit of a break, you see, so...” He simply shrugged again and looked down at his hands, which were picking at something on his thumb. Niall looked over to Scott to ensure he was taking notes before continuing.

“Okay, is that the same for you, Mr. Styles?” He moved his eyes to meet Harry’s green ones, which looked rather dull in this moment. Harry was sat quite slumped in the chair, legs spread and shaking up and down. His hands were clasped firmly in his lap and Niall could see the whites of his knuckles as he seemed to be squeezing them together rather tightly. Harry simply nodded without really meeting his eyes.

“When was the last time you contacted him, or vice versa, at all? So by call, text, or whatever else?” Once again, Louis was the one to answer:

“I called him about two weeks ago I think, and my last text to him went unanswered.”

“When was this text sent?” Louis reached into his pocket for his phone and they all waited as he looked for the answer.

“Monday.” 

“And he hasn’t replied?” Louis shook his head. Niall thought for a moment. Today was Thursday, which left a four day gap between his last contact with Louis.

“What about you, Mr. Styles?” 

“Same for me.” His voice was quite quiet, and he spoke rather slowly. “Text him on Monday and no reply since.” He was still struggling to meet Niall’s eyes, and Louis placed a reassuring arm over his shoulder. 

“Did any of Liam’s recent texts seem strange to either of you?”

“What do you mean?” Louis still had his arm round Harry, and was lightly stroking his arm with his finger. Niall thought it was quite cute, but he contained the smile that wanted to creep onto his face.

“Did anything seem different in the way he would text you? Perhaps it seemed like it wasn’t him writing the texts?” They both shook their heads at this.

“Okay, do either of you know anyone that could do a thing like this? Maybe Liam had upset a fan, or paparazzi, or made an enemy somehow?”

“I mean, we’ve had our fair share of fans stalk us and stuff, but ninety-five percent of the time they just want a picture and then they leave. We usually go out with at least one security guard when we go anywhere, so they’re dealt with if they seem dangerous.” Niall’s ears perked up at hearing this.

“Does Liam have his own personal security guard?”

“Yeah, we all do.”

“Could you write his contact details down for us?” Louis nodded, and removed his arm from around Harry to take the pen and scribbled down what Niall asked for.

“Alright, thanks a lot for coming in to talk to us.”

“No problem, mate. Do you need anything else?”

“Not right now, thank you. If you give me a moment I’ll have Jane take you somewhere where we can get you two some lunch, if you wouldn’t mind staying in the building? My team are going to be breaking for lunch soon anyway, and I’d like to talk things over before we let you go if that’s okay?” Louis nodded and Niall used his phone to call Jane, who, soon after, came to collect the two men from Niall’s office, leaving Niall and Scott alone again.

“So,” Scott began, moving to sit across from Niall once more, “seems that Styles is a lot more shaken up than Tomlinson, hey?”

“I don’t know, Scotty. People show grief in different ways, I guess.” Niall shrugged; it wasn’t really something he cared to dwell on. “So, from their accounts, Liam was probably taken sometime between Sunday and today.”

“Come on, Nialler. Let’s get some lunch, take a little break; you look like you need one.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks again for reading. I'd also like to apologise quickly, because I'd originally intended to upload this on Monday. However, I was at V Festival at the weekend and didn't get back until the early hours of Monday morning and I felt a bit grim on Monday. Then on Tuesday it was my mum's birthday and on Wednesday I got distracted by The Great British Bake Off being back so I forgot lol. Also, I may not update the next chapter as soon as I usually do because I'm having a bit of trouble writing it, so we'll see how it goes. Anyway, I appreciate you reading this, and I love getting your comments, kudos and bookmarks :D
> 
> My Tumblr is @ horanspayne


	6. “As if kidnapping and torturing their son wasn’t bad enough."

“Okay guys,” Niall began, once again stood in the front of the meeting room, all eyes on him and pens at the ready. The day had finally crawled to its end and he had gathered all of his team to debrief them. “The most important thing we’ve learnt today is that Liam was most likely taken on Monday, or sometime around then. After speaking to his personal bodyguard over the phone, he told me that Liam always reports to him before he leaves his house, even if he’s just popping over to the shops to get a carton of milk. This means he was probably taken from his home. Tech Team, take note of this information, I want you to check any CCTV footage from his house, or anywhere within a ten mile radius of his house – I’ll give you his address after this meeting.” Niall paused as he watched them writing their notes; he thought that announcing Liam’s address in front of everyone would be a bit inappropriate giving the level of fame the man had. Niall stifled a yawn before continuing, once all eyes returned to him. “No one we have interviewed yet has any clue who might’ve taken Liam and for what reason, so it is most likely that this is some stalker of his that perhaps went unnoticed by Liam, or at least he kept it to himself. That fact however, when brought up in interviews, would be unusual behaviour from Liam’s part; so we should assume he didn’t know about them either. Whoever took him knows they have the world’s eyes on them, yet hasn’t requested any sort of ransom from anyone. They show a high level of sadistic narcissism, yet have not reached out to the police at all.” Niall paused again. Victimology usually helped to narrow down what kind of person committed the crime, but with no suspect list it was seemingly useless to them. “We can all say a big thank you to our Tech Team; they managed to trace the IP address of the footage enough to show that it is coming from somewhere in this country, thankfully. Although we cannot track where exactly the signal is being emitted, or even whether it’s North or South, but at least we know we’re looking in the right country.” Niall was overwhelmed when this information had been reported to him. In past cases he had worked with local police teams and so it meant they always had a general idea what area the person they were looking for would be. In Liam’s case, he literally could’ve been anywhere around the world. Niall knew of a tendency for celebrities to spend time in Los Angeles, and when the case was first placed upon him, it was a major concern of his that he would have to give up the case to a team in the States. It would’ve killed Niall to leave a case unfinished; he craved the feeling he got when he closed each case; how satisfied he would feel once submitting his final piece of paperwork. “The man from the video made it clear that he does, in fact, care for Payne greatly; he spoke in a very caring manner, and was very tender in the way he touched him. With that said, with the level of violence shown already, we need to work quickly before something fatal happens. It doesn’t seem that he wants to kill him, but, with the instability he’s shown already, he may lose his temper and accidentally do something.” Niall winced internally at the thought. 

As he glanced down at the notes he’d picked up from the table, wondering what to talk about next, his train of thoughts were interrupted by a light knock on the door. Jane poked her head round the door after Niall called for her to come in.  
“Sir, I just received a call from Mr Payne. There’s something quite urgent you need to know.”

***

About an hour later, Niall and Scott, along with a short, pudgy young man named Elliot – who was a member of the Tech Team – arrived at the hotel in which Mr and Mrs Payne were going to be staying in. Seeing as their headquarters were in London, and the Paynes resided in the West Midlands, it seemed easier for them to stay locally rather than driving down every time they were needed. Niall looked down at the piece of paper in his hand reading: “room 317”, and led the two men behind him towards the lifts. Upon reaching the third floor, the men didn’t even have to look at the room numbers on the doors to see where their room was. There was a loud commotion being echoed down the hallway, which sounded distinctly like Mrs Payne crying. Niall wondered how often he’d be hearing that sound in the next few weeks. 

Niall checked the watch occupying his right arm and, upon seeing that it was early evening, hoped that most of the hotel’s residents would be out for dinner and not being disturbed by the commotion the Paynes were currently causing. He did feel, however, that they had every right to, given the circumstances. Niall gave a hard knock on the door, feeling that a light one probably wouldn’t be heard over the noise, and waited with both men stood either side of him. The door was flung open quickly by Mr Payne, who ushered them into the room and promptly slammed the door behind him. Liam’s parents were accompanied by what looked like a member of the hotel staff, a very flustered one at that. Said member of staff seemed very relieved to see Niall and the other men enter the room. The room was a respectable size, containing a large bed, two small bedside tables, a wardrobe, a desk and still room to be able to move around without feeling suffocated. There was also a door next to the narrow entranceway, which Niall assumed led to the bathroom. The door was currently left slightly ajar. A large television was situated upon the wall opposite the bed. The cause of the commotion was painted clearly across the television screen. Mrs Payne was currently collapsed in the desk chair, with her head on the desk and her hands over her ears as she was weeping loudly. Mr Payne was stood awkwardly behind her, rubbing a tentative hand up and down her back slowly. The hotel staff member, a man looking far too young to be dealing with this kind of thing, stood in the far side of the room, near the window, looking as if he felt rather useless. He caught Niall’s gaze and gave what he perceived to be a pleading look, begging for help in a situation he was clearly ill-equipped to deal with. He needn’t have wondered why Mrs Payne was covering her ears, as he could hear for himself. No mother should have to hear their child weeping and crying out in pain. However, that’s what she had to hear right now, because the live stream of her son’s torture was on the television screen, volume turned up high.

Jane had received a call from the hotel, informing her of the predicament. Upon arrival at the hotel, the Paynes checked into their room and within five minutes of them entering the television turned itself on. They were unable to turn it off, or even mute the sounds of their son’s torture. Of course, they tried to unplug the TV altogether but the wires disappeared into the wall instead of being plugged into a wall socket. They immediately called the hotel reception desk, demanding to know whose sick idea of a joke this was. It turned out they had moved to three different rooms already and each time, within five minutes of entering the TV would switch itself on to the stream. 

“Erm,” Niall began, clearing his throat. “Sir, er-“ He gestured towards the young man, who met his gaze again. “Could you please escort Mr and Mrs Payne down to the lobby or something? We may be a while, and I don’t want to see them suffer this any longer.” Niall felt sick. He felt bad enough watching the poor man be beaten on camera himself, so he couldn’t even fathom how his parents must’ve felt. The young man nodded and seemed to jump at the chance to leave the room too, as he walked quickly towards the door. Without another look at Niall or the other two men, Mr Payne gently pulled his wife to her feet and led her out the room. He’d wrapped his arm around her shoulders and cupped his hand on the side of her face, in a loving gesture, but also, Niall assumed, to cover her view of the screen. It warmed his heart. 

“Fucking hell.” Scott spoke up first once the three were left alone. “This is so messed up.” His hair was messed up slightly from his running his hands through it a number of times. Niall looked over in Elliot’s direction, and saw the man was looking rather pale.

“Mate,” Niall addressed him, and continued once he met his eyes. “Can you figure out how they’re doing this?” 

“I can try.” Elliot stuttered. His voice was shakier than usual. He walked warily towards the TV, as if it might get worse the closer he got. He pulled his laptop out of his bag and plugged it into the TV with a wire and began typing. Niall, not being great with computers himself, had no clue what he was doing. He knew it would probably take a while, so sat on the edge of the bed. Scott joined him soon after.

“As if kidnapping and torturing their son wasn’t bad enough. Now they’ve gotta’ rub it in their faces too.” Niall shook his head, baffled that anyone could be so cruel.

“Shit, I know.” Scott cursed. “How do they know what room they’re in though? They moved three times already!” Niall had wondered this too.

“They must have someone watching them. Maybe they have someone following them or something.” Niall shrugged, finding it difficult to think much with the sounds of Liam’s whimpers in the background.

***

The three men spent a lot of the night in the hotel room. Elliot spent hours hunched over his laptop typing away, and eventually told Niall that the stream was being channelled onto the TV with some sort of satellite. Whoever had done it definitely knew a lot about computers, and they definitely had a good sum of money to them to be able to afford the technology needed. In an effort to help the Paynes, Niall was going to have them driven back home. However, they had received a call from one of their daughters saying the same thing was happening at home too. The most they could do was find a new hotel, with no televisions in the rooms. This fact meant they weren’t staying at a hotel at quite the same quality as their original one, but it was worth it to them. 

Niall, himself, was thankful when his head finally hit the pillow that night, or early morning, but he felt rather naive when he ultimately got no sleep. Thoughts of Liam raced through his mind. An endless number of questions flooded his brain to the point he felt as if he were drowning in his own confusion.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So sorry it's taken me longer than usual to update, but I just had so much trouble getting this chapter done. I had the next chapter written as well, literally had one sentence left to write with almost 2000 words and I accidentally deleted it, and I wasn't in the mood to rewrite it yesterday. I'll try and get some of it written today so I can hopefully update the fic by Monday next week like I have been before, but we'll have to see because school starts again tomorrow :/  
> Anyway, thanks a lot for reading, and a huge thanks to people leaving kudos, commenting and bookmarking - it means a lot! :D  
> Tumblr: @ horanspayne


	7. “Hang on! We know where he is?”

By the end of the week, Niall was exhausted. Harry and Louis had been spending all hours of the day in the building up until the last of the team had gone home for the day, excluding Niall. Niall himself had been staying in his office into the late hours of the night, and only going home to shower and change his clothes so he looked presentable. Harry and Louis were desperate to help in any way possible, so they would linger in the reception, break room and Niall’s office, to name a few places, hoping to catch news of anything related to their bandmate. Niall really felt for them. However, despite this, he was rather grateful the Paynes opted to stay out the way. Hearing Liam suffer was bad enough; Niall didn’t want to hear the echoes of Mrs Payne crying too.

***

Two weeks later, Niall was beginning to feel as useless as Louis and Harry probably felt. He’d been working in his office for hours on end, sleep becoming almost non-existent to his routine. Despite spending so long working away, he hadn’t come up with anything much. He took it upon himself to watch the CCTV footage of Liam’s house. Niall spent hours watching the footage of Liam being driven to and from his house a number of times. At around half past eleven on Monday night the footage cut off and the next time it started up again was about three o’clock in the morning on Tuesday. Niall concluded that this meant their theory about Liam being taken on the Monday must’ve been true. Using this information, they asked his neighbours whether they’d seen anything around that time. Given the hour, however, very few people saw anything. What they learnt from the information they gathered was that a big, black car – no one was very certain about the make – pulled into his driveway at around midnight. They were only alerted to this because of the motion sensor lights turning on outside Liam’s house. However, no one saw anyone get out of the car, nor get into it. Nobody saw anybody leaving or entering the house, nor heard any noise that seemed unusual, yet the car was gone by the morning.

Because they now had confirmation that Liam was taken from his house, he and a few of his team went to investigate his home in hopes of finding something. Nothing much was found there except some tyre marks on the driveway. They also checked the CCTV cameras for fingerprints, but none were found.  
Overall, this information was pretty useless to Niall. It didn’t help him find any suspects still, and it didn’t really give him somewhere to go with his investigation. It just seemed like a waiting game.

***

Three weeks had passed. Niall’s head was pounding. His sleep schedule didn’t exist anymore, and he rarely even left his office. He was sick of staring at screens and his eyes hurt. He didn’t even attempt to go to sleep anymore. When he closed his eyes, images of Liam would flash in his mind and he would get that sick feeling in his stomach like he would throw up, and sometimes he actually had. If it wasn’t images of Liam, it’d be the sounds of his torture. Even though it wasn’t Niall in the chair in that damn room, he felt as though he was suffering too.

Niall spent all hours of the day on his computer. He went through what felt like millions of photographs taken by paparazzi, hoping to find a person repeatedly lurking in the background. He trailed through hours of CCTV footage of anywhere Liam had even sniffed within five miles of. When he wasn’t doing that he was watching the video stream. As difficult as it was for him to watch it, it was harder for him to look away. Niall wasn’t a sadist; it was more like when you see a bad car crash, or a fight in public – you know you shouldn’t really keep looking, but you can’t help but stare.

“Jesus, Niall.” He was so captivated by his computer screen that Niall hadn’t even noticed Scott walk into his office unannounced – not like he ever knocked anyway. Niall only noticed his presence when he spoke up, but did nothing to acknowledge that he had heard. “You look terrible.” Scott was always known to being quite blunt with people. “When’s the last time you showered?” Niall shrugged and Scott sighed. “When’s the last time you ate?” Once again, Niall’s only response was a shrug. Scott moved so he was stood next to Niall and placed a hand on his shoulder. He gave it a small squeeze before speaking again. “When’s the last time you even left your office?” Niall shrugged. He still hadn’t even removed his gaze from the screen; the only way Scott knew he was being heard was due to Niall’s small shrugs. Scott grabbed Niall by both his shoulders and turned him around in his chair, so he had no choice but to look at him. Niall recognised the concern he was projecting through his eyes. Scott’s naturally pale face looked paler than usual as he scanned Niall’s appearance. He obviously didn’t like what he saw as Niall saw his frown deepen. He closed his tired-looking, blue eyes briefly before speaking again. “Come on, Nialler, let’s go get something to eat.” Niall turned to look at the computer screen again, almost longingly, without giving Scott an answer. “Hey, look at me!” He did. “I’ve got something really great to tell you about the case.” Niall’s eyes brightened at this comment. “But you’ve got to come and get with dinner with me first.”

***

A short while later Niall found himself sat on Scott’s familiar-looking couch in his living room, a box of pizza on the coffee table before him and Scott sat to his right. Niall had been in this room a fair few number of times. Scott was one of his best friends, and the two would often spend time together outside of work. They also sometimes came to each other’s flats to mull over a case when in good need of a change in environment to the office. Scott’s flat looked a lot more “lived in” than Niall’s. As Niall took a moment to take in the living room, he thought of how bare his seemed in comparison. The walls were littered with various photographs of family and friends, Niall actually making an appearance in a couple, and few random paintings. Niall had always wanted to ask why Scott had them, if they had any special meaning behind them. Scott, however, was a friend Niall rarely spoke about that kind of thing with. In one corner of the room lay a large bookcase, filled with all colours of books. Niall knew Scott wasn’t much of a reader, which is why the bottom two rows of the shelf were filled with DVDs instead. In the opposite corner of the room lay the very thing Niall was most jealous of: a large box filled with Scott’s vinyl collection. Niall loved flicking through the box and being absolutely filled with awe at what Scott owned, from The Eagles, to Pink Floyd, and whatever else. Scott, of course, also had a vinyl player, which sat proudly next to the box. 

As Niall chewed on his pizza, he felt it tasted unusually bitter in his mouth. He looked over to Scott to see if he was thinking the same thing, but he looked quite content as he reached forward to take another slice from the box. Niall placed the pizza back on his plate and sighed. He really could think of nothing other than Liam. The man had completely overtaken his mind and he couldn’t focus on anything else. Even now, whilst sitting beside one of his best friends, eating a food he typically loved, in a room that usually relaxed him, Niall was still riled up. His legs were shaking up and down, projecting his internal frustration.

“So,” he began, startling Scott slightly as he broke the silence, “what was this great news?” Scott rewarded Niall’s question with a large smile, showing off his perfect top row of teeth to him. 

“Niall, you won’t believe it! It’s truly amazing!”

“Here we go. Get on with it, will you?” Niall wasn’t particularly in the mood for Scott’s over-dramatisation. His sour mood did nothing to dampen Scott’s, however.

“So, you know how the Tech Team have been absolutely working their arses off?” Niall nodded, taking another bite of his pizza, despite the taste it left in his mouth; he knew he needed to eat. “And you know how whoever has this Payne guy has been using all this technology, streaming that video everywhere, tormenting his family and everything?” Niall nodded again and sighed; obviously he knew all of this. “Well, because of all that, it’s made it easier for the Tech Team to get a trace on where the transmission is coming from.” Niall almost choked on his bite of pizza.

“Hang on! We know where he is?” Niall wanted to jump up in excitement, feeling a sudden burst of energy that he hadn’t felt in days.

“We don’t know the exact location, but we know which county.” Scott raised his eyebrows, clearly knowing he’d got Niall’s hopes up, and carefully watching to see if this comment would let him down.

“Where, then?” Luckily for Scott, Niall was still as excited about any change in the case as ever.

“He’s somewhere in the West Midlands.” Niall went silent for a moment, deep in thought.

“Birmingham is in the West Midlands, right?” 

 

“Yes, Niall.” Scott rolled his eyes and snorted at Niall’s lack of geography knowledge. This earned him a playful shove.

“Shut up, Matthews.” Niall cracked a smile, his first in what felt like forever.

“Why’d you ask?” Niall leant forward, his grin growing even more and Scott saw the slight sparkle of life returning to his eyes.

“I think I know where Liam is!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry it's taken me so long to update. I've been feeling a bit of writer's block with this fic, but luckily writing for the NiamNetwork helped me out a bit. I don't know how long it'll be until the next chapter is up, so sorry to leave you on a cliffhanger like this without promise of a quick update.   
> Anyway, thanks a lot for reading and sticking around with this story, I hope you're enjoying it. Big thanks to people leaving kudos, bookmarks and comments; I really appreciate it.  
> Hmu on Tumblr @ horanspayne if you'd like! :D


	8. “Come on, buddy, we’re here.”

Niall chewed on his fingernails as he watched the streets fly by through the car window. It was a habit he just couldn’t seem to kick, but also one he wasn’t in a rush to try and quit. As far back as he could remember he’d been biting his nails, chewing them down until there was nothing left to chew. Since working Liam’s case he’d chewed so hard that his fingers bled sometimes; practically gnawing away on the skin as if he hadn’t eaten in days. In all honesty, he hadn’t. The same went for sleeping. 

He stared out the window, at nothing in particular, watching the trees blur by in a haze of green. His leg was jumping up and down quickly, annoyingly so according to Scott, who’d complained at least three times already.

“Niall, would you just relax? Please?” Scott gave him a quick glance before looking back through the windscreen. His right hand was resting on top of the steering wheel whilst his left hand lay casually in his lap. His relaxed composure was the complete opposite of Niall’s somewhat jumpy one.

“But what if I’m wrong, Scott?” It was two hours into their drive to Birmingham, and Niall was finally voicing his concerns.

“Then we go again.” Niall rolled his eyes at this. This saying was something Scott was quite fond of: “we go again”. He was a Liverpool fan, and after their former captain made the phrase famous there was rarely a time Scott didn’t use the phrase in situations like this. It was always met with a roll of the eyes from Niall, but this time it went further than their football rivalry.

“Scott! I’m being serious!”

“So am I!” Scott looked a little insulted at Niall’s comment. “Look Ni, it won’t be the end of the world if we don’t find the lad. It’s not like we’ve told his parents or anything, so they won’t have their hopes up. If we don’t find him, we fucking go again!” He looked over to Niall again; his face one of pure seriousness, and Niall now felt a little guilty for rolling his eyes before. “Besides, it’s not like you’re basing it on nothing.”

“It’s more of a gut feeling than certain knowledge, though.”

“Well, that’s better than nothing.” He shrugged and the two fell into silence, just the revving of the car in the background. Niall found the noise almost deafening. He was tired, hungry and desperate, and this was all making him rather irritable. 

“How much further?” He barked out the question suddenly , making Scott jump.

“Sat-Nav says we’ve got half an hour left.” Niall sighed loudly and dramatically. “Oi, would you just chill out?”

“Fuck off.” Niall knew he was being unnecessarily nasty, but he couldn’t find it in him to care right now.

***

Niall hadn’t even realised he’d closed his eyes and fallen asleep until he was being woken up by Scott shaking him. He felt groggy and his head was pounding; that had been some of the best sleep Niall had had all week in that small half hour, and it was really taking its toll on him.

“Come on, buddy, we’re here.” Niall’s stomach flipped as he climbed out the car, door opened for him by Scott. He squinted a little at the brightness of the sun, reflecting brightly off the big metal structure before him. The corrugated steel of the warehouse was discoloured with rust, so much so that Niall could barely see the deep blue colour it once was; now replaced with a coppery red. The sign near the top of the building was so faded that Niall could hardly make out the words: “Galliford Try”. The size of the warehouse intimidated the woman a little, as she gazed up at it, craning her neck. An odd feeling crept up in the pit of Niall’s stomach as he noticed the emptiness of the car park. Of course, the police cars were there, but no others. Perhaps they’d got the wrong place. But then again, wouldn’t it look rather odd if there were a flurry of cars surrounding a warehouse that was supposedly out of use. Niall stretched his arms and legs exaggeratedly, trying to soothe the slight ache that had come from sitting in the car for so long. He rubbed his neck where a crick had started to form as he slept. He glanced at Scott, who had his back towards the warehouse; watching the hoard of police cars flood into the car park of the warehouse. All of Niall’s team that weren’t desk jockeys had come to the warehouse too, as well as a mix of local West Midlands police and Scotland Yard police. Niall was sure they’d need lots of back up. He checked her watch, feeling rather antsy. He was desperate to get inside and get on with finding the Payne lad, but Niall knew he needed to wait for everyone to arrive before they could do anything. He’d been planning how to enter and get the man out in his head ever since he knew where they needed to go. The motors in his head were scorching hot from the rate they’d been turning at, and it was causing Niall to have a pounding headache. He didn’t notice Scott wander over to the arriving police; instead opening the car back up to take a few painkillers, hoping to ease his pain some. 

After what felt like an eternity, Scott made his way back over to Niall.

“Alright, buddy. Everyone’s here. I’ve told all the top guys to come over to us so you can do your briefing.” He handed Niall a sheet of paper. “These are all the guys that will be coming, I’ve written their names down for you. Each of these guys is in charge of a team of at least five people.” Niall nodded, quickly glancing over the paper. He was always so thankful for Scott, knowing nothing would get done without his right hand man. He was much more organised than Niall and was rather a lot less emotional, so his head tended to stay clear in each case. It was times like these that Niall questioned why he was offered head of department, and not Scott. He would be much better at it. Niall assumed perhaps it was Scott’s lack of people skills and sensitivity that leaned the job in Niall’s favour.

He read over the sheet, Scott also having written next to particular names if the team specialised in anything and where they’d come from. After giving it a thorough once over, he looked back up, seeing the small crowd of important looking men and women who had now gathered around Scott and himself.

“Okay, everyone listen up!” Niall began, grabbing everyone’s attention immediately. “Liam Payne is possibly somewhere in this warehouse; we don’t know that for definite, but I’m pretty sure of it. If he’s here, that means his kidnappers are probably here too. If you’ve been watching the videos, then I’m sure you know how violent these guys are, and I’m one hundred percent certain this lot won’t give up Mr Payne without a fight, so we need to be prepared for one. I need the whole building surrounded by the armed police, so-“ Niall looked down at the paper, reading a few names off. “- Brians, Sparrow, Dawson and Kirkland: I want you four to get together and decide how your teams are going to surround it. We need all exits covered, and we need you all to be prepared for a shootout.” The four people in question, three burly looking men and one small but fierce looking woman, nodded; letting Niall know they’d understood. “Okay. The rest of the teams are going to be entering the building, except-“ He paused once more, skimming over the names. “Barry and White. I want your teams to be on standby, helping surround the building but ready to run inside if need be. The teams are going to be a mix of normal police and armed police; I’m going to pair up each of you.” Niall rattled off a list of names he’d decided to pair up, followed by short nods by the people in question. “My team will be on its own, and I will decide what to do individually with each member. Emmerett and Smith – your team will be the ones breaking down that door.” He pointed towards the large shuttered door at the centre of the building. “After that, each team will be sent in one at a time. Rogers and Timms – your team will be first to enter. I want you lot to survey the inside of the building and feedback Intel on what you see, if there are multiple floors, anything like that. Okay, is everything clear?” He paused briefly, waiting for any questions. He was met with a few head nods. “Good. We have half an hour until go time – I want the cover teams to set up straight away and survey the outside of the building. See if there’s anything we might need to know. I want the entry team to work on out how they’ll be breaking the door down, and everyone needs to feedback to your teams, and prepare yourselves. This won’t be easy.” Niall watched the crowd slowly dissipate before him. Scott came and stood next to him again.

“You doing okay, Nialler?” His eyes were filled with concern, but Niall could also see the slight bit of excitement in the back of Scott’s eyes. This was Scott’s favourite part of the job, and Niall couldn’t disagree with him on that. Nothing beat the rush of getting someone out alive, with the adrenaline pumping through your veins and your heart beating ten times faster than normal. Niall’s heart began to race just with the thought of dragging Liam out of his personal hell. It was much better than staring blankly at a computer screen 24/7 or doing paperwork, that’s for sure. 

“Yeah, yeah. I’m ready to get this over with.” Niall nodded his head quickly. Scott smiled at him, the glimmer of excitement in his eyes growing. He squeezed Niall’s shoulder.

“Atta boy Nialler!” 

***

The half hour passed by in a blur. Niall had fully briefed his own team on the plan, gotten himself fitted with a bulletproof vest, and prepared his weapon. He was ready. He signalled everyone over towards the warehouse, now surrounded by a circle of black. It reminded Niall of when he’d dropped a crisp in the garden, and the ants had swarmed towards it as if pulled by a magnet. He supposed that’s what it looked like, perhaps, if someone was viewing them from above. The entry team walked towards the door, with what looked like a large battering ram in their hands. Rogers and Timms’ team were waiting behind them, ready to run in as soon as the door was opened. Everyone was ready. They were all waiting on Niall’s signal. He took a deep breath to compose himself, glanced at his watch and nodded towards Emmerett. Noting Niall’s nod, the man waved his hand and the entry team began smacking the battering ram against the door. Niall had taken into account that this would probably signal to anyone inside that they were there, but he hadn’t managed to work out another way for them to enter. Within a minute the door had been broken open; the rustiness of the metal making it break easier. As the metal clattered onto the cement floor, Niall’s heart seemed to jump in sync with it. This was it. It was really happening. Sometime in the next hour, Niall may finally be able to pull the Payne lad out of his hellhole. Niall had been dreaming of this moment since Scott brought him the case, and he felt a little in shock at the prospect that this could be it.

“Nialler! Wake up, buddy!” Scott shook Niall’s shoulder. He hadn’t realised he’d zoned out, but was thankful Scott had brought him back. “Come on, pay attention.”

“Yeah, yeah, sorry.” He rubbed his temples with his hands gently, soothing the slowly decreasing ache in his head. 

“Hey, Horan!” Niall heard his radio buzz. He unclipped it from his belt and brought it towards his face.

“What’s up?”

“Mate, it’s dead in here.” Rogers voice crackled through the speaker.

“What do you mean?”

“I mean there’s no one here!” Niall’s heart sank. He shook his head and ran his free hand through his hair. 

‘No, no. This couldn’t be!’ Niall thought to himself. He was sure he’d found the right place!

“Uh, well scope out the building for me anyway.” Niall’s self assurance was faltering. He knew some of the people would’ve been doubting him because of his age, and the fact many of these lot didn’t know him. He didn’t want them to lose confidence in him and give up. He was desperate by this point.

“Well, from what we can see, there’s more than one floor.”

“Okay, wait one second, I’ll send another team to check out that floor.” Niall signalled over to the next team, waiting to enter. They immediately ran in and headed straight towards the stairs. Looking up at the building, Niall didn’t expect to be more than one floor up; it wasn’t tall enough.

“Are there any more floors?”

“Nah, looks like just that one.”

“How big is it?”

“Pretty damn big mate.” Niall turned to view the other teams he had waiting, thinking about what to do.

“Alright, listen up!” Niall gathered their attention onto him. “There are two floors, and it seems pretty empty in there. I’m gonna split the rest of you up into two teams, one for the top floor, one for the ground. 

Although it seems empty, none of you let your guard down. They could be hiding, or have set traps to catch us out. Be careful!” He pointed to particular teams, dividing them up into top and bottom, and sent them in one at a time. He turned to his own team, and split them up too. “Scott, I’m gonna send you upstairs, I’m staying downstairs.” Scott shook his head.

“Nuh uh, no way. I’m not having you spacing out on us in there; I don’t want you getting hurt.”He squeezed the smaller man’s shoulder gently, and Niall simply nodded in agreement. 

“Fine, whatever. Let’s go.” He took a deep breath, before turning to the doorway. He braced himself, glancing at Scott once before stepping inside. The inside of the warehouse was huge. It was completely empty, with no walls, and simply thick cement pillars holding the place up. The lights had been turned on, but Niall assumed they were pretty old seeing as they were so dim and yellow. Niall went straight for the back of the warehouse, knowing the others would’ve gone closer to the entrance first. Scott was closely on his tail. Niall was feeling rather frustrated, seeing as the whole warehouse looked the same to him. Where in the hell was Liam? Niall leant back into the wall and sank onto the floor, tucking his knees into himself and dropping his head over them. Scott joined him, placing his hand on the knee closest to him.

“Come on, Nialler. I bet he’s here somewhere. You’re always right.”

“What about with that Brownlow kid? We stormed into the wrong house and ruined their family dinner didn’t we?” Scott laughed at that.

“Yeah, well, that one was on me, wasn’t it? Thought I knew how to read a map.”

“Hmm.” Niall lifted her head to smile at his friend, thankful he was by his side. He looked straight forward, eyes scanning the floor in front of him. “Hey, Scott, pass me your phone!” The man beside him reached into his pocket, fetching the requested item unquestioningly. Niall turned the torch on and pointed it towards the ground before him. “Holy shit, Scott, look!” Niall scrambled onto all fours, Scott following quickly behind.

“What is it?”

“There’s a trapdoor!” Niall pointed before him, watching Scott follow his finger. On the floor in front of them was a small section of the floor that had an indented square. By passing glance you could easily miss it, but Niall had been staring directly at it. 

“Shit!” Scott crawled over to it, running his hands over the cool concrete. He knocked it with his knuckles, and his head flew up in Niall’s direction when the hollow sound echoed back. “How are we meant to open it?” Niall crawled over to join him.

“Let me take a look. You radio it in; say I want two bottom floor teams over here.” Scott nodded, and began feeding back what Niall had said into the little speaker he’d removed from his hip. Niall ran his hands around the indents on the floor, trying to work out how to lift it. They were too narrow to fit his fingers and lift from there. He was about to tell Scott to get someone to bring them a crowbar, when he noticed a small panel in the centre of the door. He pushed on it, and the panel moved, revealing a small handle. Niall prepared himself to pull it open; checking to make sure the rest of the teams had arrived in case they needed back up. “Everyone ready?” He glanced up to check, observing their nodding heads. “Alright, in 3, 2, 1...” Niall heaved it up and placed the door onto the ground beside him; the whole thing lifting out of the ground. He had revealed another set of stairs, leading down into what must’ve been a basement. “Get us one of the top floor teams down here too, Scott.” Niall commanded, not sure how big the basement would be. He signalled for one team to enter first, and then, after hearing the all clear, sent the next one down. He and Scott quickly followed after them, not wanting to wait for the other team to arrive.  
It was pitch black in the basement until somebody found the light switches on the wall. The lights flickered on, much brighter than the upstairs ones, causing them all to squint slightly. The basement was much smaller; the stairs led into a narrow hallway which had a few doors in the walls. Niall signalled for everyone to stay quiet and to split up and investigate the rooms. He, Scott, and a few armed police went for the one at the opposite end of the hallway, where a lone door stood facing them. Niall slowly turned the handle, thankful it was unlocked, and carefully pushed the door open. He recognised the room immediately, having stared at it blankly for weeks on end now. It was a small box room, with a chair in the very centre. In that chair sat a large figure, hunched in on themselves. Niall’s heart fluttered: Liam Payne! He’d found him! 

After looking around the room and deciding it was safe to go in, Niall told the others to let him go in alone; not wanting to overwhelm the man. Scott shut the door quietly behind him. Niall walked carefully over to the chair in the middle, crouching so he’d be eye level if the man looked up at him.

“Liam? Liam Payne?” The man’s head slowly rose to look at him, clearly confused by Niall’s presence. Niall was shocked by how young he looked in person. Any pictures he’d seen made him look like a typical mid-twenties man; with his shortly styled hair and gruff beard. Now, all Niall could see was a boy. His eyes were dull with desperation and a hint of hopelessness. He would’ve assumed he was looking into a mirror at his own eyes if it weren’t for the warm brown staring back at him, instead of his own cool blue. It was hard to make out any other features, for his face was stained with dried blood. The bright red colour one would associate with blood, long ago dried to a brown. As Niall took in the whole man before him, it seemed his whole body was coated with a layer of dried blood. The smell in the room was rather pungent; Niall never once seeing the man’s captors take him out to let him use the toilet or to shower. The man’s arms were tied behind his back, and his whole body was slumped forward, as if an admission of defeat. He had well and truly given up, and Niall couldn’t blame him. Liam was watching him, so Niall smiled at him; trying to come off as warm. He wanted Liam to know he was here to help him, give him back his sense of hope. 

“Hi Liam. My name’s Niall. Niall Horan. I am the detective who was assigned to your case. I’ve gotta tell you mate, you’ve been keeping me up for the past few weeks stressing over you. You sure are a sight for sore eyes.” He received no response from the man, and Niall wondered whether he could even hear him. Perhaps he’d been made deaf or something in some sick torture technique that Niall maybe didn’t notice. These thoughts were quashed when he saw the man pull a face at the noise from Niall’s radio. Scott had been informing the rest of the team that Liam had been found, and asking Niall what to do next. “I need everyone to clear the warehouse, ensure it’s completely safe before I bring him out of here.” This was followed by a short “yes boss” from Scott’s end. 

Niall reached into his pocket and pulled out a small pocket knife. He cringed when he saw Liam flinch.

“No, no, don’t worry. I’m just cutting you free from the chair. Doesn’t look very comfy.” Niall’s words didn’t seem to soothe the man, however, as he looked rather nervous as he brought the knife towards him, cutting his restraints off him. Liam immediately sunk off the chair and slid onto the floor. Niall would’ve happily let him lay there, if he hadn’t started coughing badly. Niall gently grabbed him underneath his arms and pulled him over to one wall, propping him against it. Niall sat beside him. He watched the man’s head flop down again, as if his neck was giving way the same way his body did when it was no longer bound to the chair. Niall assumed he was falling asleep, the man probably getting even less sleep than Niall, if any at all, since being locked up. He felt rather cruel when he shook him awake, knowing the paramedics would want to have him awake if possible when they look him over. He glanced up at Niall with his big puppy eyes, and his heart melted.

“Sorry, Liam, but you can’t go to sleep yet. You need to stay awake so we can give you a proper look over.” He nodded in understanding. Niall knew he would struggle to keep him awake, so he wanted to keep talking to the boy, in a desperate attempt to keep him conscious. 

“W-water?” He choked out. His voice was very faint; Niall was sure it must’ve faded from all his shouting and screaming and crying in here. Also, from the lack of use of it in the past few weeks.

“I’m so sorry, Liam, I can’t give you food or drink. If you need an operation, it would have to be delayed because your stomach has to be empty. I’m really really sorry.” Niall felt extremely guilty. Liam wanted such a simple thing he’d been deprived of for so long, and he couldn’t give it to him. 

“S’okay.” Liam slowly nodded, looking his legs stretched out in front of him.

“Liam, why don’t you tell me a bit about yourself?” Niall figured the man couldn’t sleep if he was talking. He simply shrugged at Niall, so he decided to elaborate on his question. “Like, erm, what’s your favourite colour?”

“Purple.”

“Ahh, that’s a good one. Mine’s green.”

“Hmm, Irish.” Liam nodded. Niall laughed.

“So you noticed the accent then?” He joked. “Whereabouts are you from?”

“Wolver-“ He broke out in a very painful sounding coughing fit, cutting himself off. Niall, taking a small risk, reached out and gently rubbed at his back. Liam flinched at first, but slowly relaxed into the touch. “Wolverhampton.” He finished.

“Ohh, so not too far from here right?” Niall questioned.

“Where are we?” Of course he wouldn’t know.

“Birmingham. In the centre.”

“Yeah then, not too far.” Liam nodded.

“What’s your favourite film, Liam?” The man paused for a moment, thinking.

“Hmm. I really love Harry Potter.” He paused for a moment, still thinking. “But I’ve gotta say Toy Story.” 

“Toy Story, hey?” Niall laughed. Liam simply nodded. “Which one?”

“All three.” Liam had finally turned to look at Niall, actually smiling now. Niall couldn’t help but notice how bright his teeth were, despite the fact they hadn’t been brushed in a while. He supposed Liam hadn’t been eating much since he was here. Niall had noticed how much skinnier he seemed than in all the pictures he’d seen. The pictures showed Liam to be a large, muscled man, but now he seemed much less bulky; his clothes seemingly baggy on him.

“You much into football?” Liam nodded in response. “You got a team?”

“Yeah, West Brom.” Niall wrinkled his nose a little.

“The Baggies? Really?”

“Mhmm. I know they’re not the best team out there, but they’re the only West Midlands team in the Premier League now.” Niall noted that Liam’s voice was coming out much clearer than before; still sounding a little  
hoarse.

“Derby County for me.” Niall beamed, proud of his team.

“They’re not even in the Premier League, and you were judging me for West Brom?” He smiled at Niall, a small twinkle sparking in them that wasn’t there before.

“Okay, okay, whatever. But we’ll be there next season I’m sure. We’re on our way to promotion.”

“They’re like that every season!”

“Yeah, but this is our season, I’m telling you Liam!” They both laughed quietly, Liam rolling his eyes at Niall’s supposed delusions. The buzzing of Niall’s radio suddenly brought them both back to the reality of the situation. 

“All clear, Ni.”

“Okay, we’re coming out then.” He turned towards Liam. “You ready to go?”

“More than ready.” He nodded, eagerly. 

Scott had entered the room, guessing that Niall would need help bringing the other man up the stairs. 

“Liam, this is Scott. My right hand man, and favourite pain in the arse.”

“Ha ha.” Scott laughed, sarcastically. “There’ll be time for formalities later, let’s get him out of this shithole.” They both helped pull Liam to his feet, and upon realising he probably wouldn’t be able to walk out on his own, they each placed an arm around him – Niall on his left, Scott on his right – and carried him up and out of the warehouse, over towards the waiting ambulance. Niall stood with Liam as the paramedics got him strapped into a stretcher, deciding to take him straight to the hospital and check on him there. Niall was about to offer himself up to go with him to the hospital, seeing how alone and scared the man looked, but was pulled away by Scott before he could. He instead watched the ambulance speed off out of the car park, siren blaring and blue lights flashing.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks a lot for reading, really appreciate it.  
> Okay, so I'm proper sorry, I didn't realise how long it'd been since I updated this. I send each chapter of this fic to my friend (I've been sending her pretty much all my writing for years now), and she'd kept hassling me to write this one, and it was her birthday on the 12th Jan, so I was up til midnight the night before writing it in time for her birthday lmao. Anyway, I always wait for her to critique it before uploading anything, but by the time she had, my laptop crashed and I'd forgotten to save this chapter anywhere else. Luckily bc I'd sent it to her on fb I could just copy and paste it from the message. But I send stuff to her with different names lmao, so I had to go through and change all of them. Usually I write it with Niall and Liam's names first and then just change them for her, bc I always miss some and I'd rather make the mistake for her instead of AO3. Anyway, I just wanted to put that out there, bc I may have left Niall being called Rachel Wilson, or Liam as Adam Pierce, or just keeping the female pronouns for Niall instead of the male ones - so that's why. When my laptop is hopefully working again, if it ever is, I'll redo this chapter to double check it's all right.
> 
> Thanks again for reading, and deepest apologies for the wait. Hopefully it won't be too long before I can do the next one. Big love :D


	9. "They must’ve known we were coming.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry it's been so long. This chapter is rather short, and I'm not sure if it's very interesting. I felt as though I was neglecting Harry and Louis so I wanted to add a bit more of them in this chapter. I'm excited for the next chapter though!

Niall was completely exhausted by the time they'd made it back to London. As he entered his office, he spotted the familiar figures of Liam's band mates passed out on the couch in there. This had become a regular occurrence. The two boys were so desperate to know every little thing that was happening involving Liam that they would sit in Niall's office and watch him work; respectfully so, however. There was many a time in the past three weeks that Niall found them fast asleep in there too. At least they were getting some sleep, Niall wavered, and probably more than he'd got in the past few weeks.

Liam was taken to Heartlands hospital in Birmingham, the closest one possible to the warehouse. Niall had given the hospital his contact details and told them to keep him up to date about everything. So far they’d told him that Liam was currently undergoing surgery and when he’s fit to travel they’ll move him to a hospital closer to Niall and his office.

There wasn’t much for Niall to do until Liam was awake for interviewing and Niall wasn’t sure how long that would take. A few members of his team remained in Birmingham with the West Midlands forensic team, collecting any evidence they could scavenge from the warehouse. Niall and his team were currently stuck in everyone’s least favourite part of an investigation; barely any evidence, no one to interview and no suspects. This was typically the stage Niall was most exhausted.

***

“How did you know where to find him?” Louis’ voice made Niall jump. He was sat at his desk scrolling through social media, curious to see what the media was saying about his case. He hadn’t even realised Louis and Harry were in his office.

“What do you mean?” Niall hadn’t slept in days and so he wasn’t processing things very well.

“I mean, how did you find him?” Louis repeated. Harry gave him a side glance, as if telling him to explain further. “Well, you had no clue for weeks and then suddenly, as if you had some mad epiphany, you just knew exactly where to find him.”

“I didn’t know for sure. I was watching the stream of Liam and at some point the camera got knocked. At the new angle I could see this thing in the background. It was really small, but I mean, when you’re staring at the same thing for days on end, any small difference becomes really obvious.” Niall’s throat felt hoarse; reminding him he hadn’t drunk anything for a while.

“What did you see?” Harry asked, his slow drawl getting slower with each sleep deprived day.

“There was this sticker on the wall behind Liam. It was kind of faded, but I could sort of make out the logo on the top, I just couldn’t read the name of the company.”  
“What was the company?”

“Have you heard of Galliford Try?” Niall queried. Both Louis and Harry shook their heads. “Oh, well, it’s a construction company, builds houses and things like that.” 

The two men nodded in acknowledgement, urging Niall to continue. “I used to work in construction for while to earn some money when I was at uni, which is why I recognised the logo.”

“What does the logo look like?” Harry asked. Louis pulled a face as if to ask, ‘why does that matter, Harry?’.

“Hmm, well.” Niall paused for a bit, unsure of how to describe it. “It’s shaped like a coffee bean, sort of, but split in two halves. The top half is red and the bottom half is grey.”

“So, from the logo you worked out the company who must’ve owned the warehouse?” Louis asked. Niall nodded. “But how did you know where the warehouse was?”

“Because whoever kidnapped Liam wanted the world to see what was happening, the IP address of the stream was slightly easier to find. We couldn’t pinpoint exactly where it was being transmitted from, but we managed to see it was coming from the West Midlands.”

“But how did you work out Birmingham? The West Midlands is a big place.” Harry questioned. Louis unsubtly rolled his eyes, clearly frustrated at Harry’s interruptions. Niall had noticed their growing annoyance with each other, probably from the two basically living on the couch in Niall’s office for a month.

“Yeah, but once I recognised the Galliford Try logo, I thought it was probably an old warehouse of theirs.” He’d really hoped it was, but he didn’t want to tell Harry and Louis that he was carrying out the investigation of their band mate’s kidnapping based on hope instead of actual fact. “We then researched Galliford Try warehouses in the West Midlands, and there weren’t many. The one in Birmingham caught my eye because it had been closed down for a few years, but unlike the other ones that had been shut; someone had bought this one and not done anything with it for years. It’s owned by someone – we’re in the process of working out who – but appears completely abandoned.”

“That’s really clever!” Harry’s eyes widened. Louis nodded in agreement. Niall blushed, unsure of how to respond. He didn’t receive compliments often, most people too fixated on judging his young age to see past it.

“Thank you.” He replied, quietly.

“So, what happens now?” Louis asked.

“We’ve got some people working with forensics in Birmingham. They’re collecting evidence from the warehouse and seeing if they can find anything that can indicate who took Liam.” Niall began to explain. He decided not to tell them that there wasn’t much hope in scouring the warehouse for evidence seeing as hundreds of people have probably been inside it; leaving DNA all over.

“How long will that take?”

“It should take a few days. It’s a high profile case and Liam is still at risk, so anything sent for analysis will be fast tracked.”

“Liam is still at risk! What?” Harry’s eyes widened the fear evident in them. Louis squeezed his thigh in what Niall considered was meant to be a comforting gesture. Meanwhile Niall was mentally kicking himself for mentioning that. Of course it would worry them that their friend was still in danger.

“Yeah, um, sorry.” Niall coughed. “He’s got twenty four hour surveillance; he’ll never be alone.”

“Why’s he still in danger?” Harry exclaimed.

“Because we haven’t caught whoever it was that kidnapped Liam.” Louis nodded in understanding.

“So there’ll always be some risk until the guys are caught?”

“Yeah, that’s right Louis.” Niall took note of Harry’s face and the disturbed expression he still wore. “I promise you guys, he’s completely safe in our care. I trust my team completely to protect him.”

“When can we see him?” Harry blurted out after a moments silence. Niall knew both men were just bursting to ask him that question from the moment he’d told them they’d found him.

“I can’t give you an exact answer to that.” Harry’s face fell and Louis squeezed his thigh once more. “He’s currently undergoing surgery and once he’s fit enough he’ll be moved to a hospital closer by. We then need to interview him to see what he remembers and what he may be able to tell us about the people who took him.”

“Do we have to wait for you to be done questioning him before we can see him?” Harry asked rather glumly.

“I’d prefer it that way.”

“Why?” Louis’ face told Niall that he hadn’t meant for his question to come out so accusingly, but it did nonetheless.

“Because, if he doesn’t remember much, he’ll start asking you questions, and I’d rather not have ideas put in his head about what may have happened.” Niall saw Louis open his mouth to object but he quickly cut him off. “I’m not saying you will! In the past, I’ve had victims suffer amnesia and then spoken to family members, and they put ideas into their heads and so innocent people almost got convicted. I’m sure in your heads you’ve been speculating and trying to piece together this mystery, and so you have ideas of your own about who may have done this and why. That’s all well and good, but I need to hear it from Liam first.” The two men nodded.

“Alright, that makes sense.” Louis said softly, perhaps trying to make up for his accidental accusatory tone previously.

“Do you want to hear our theories?” Harry spoke up. The room had fallen silent for a while; Harry and Louis both staring at the floor in front of them, whilst Niall had returned to his phone briefly. Harry’s question had startled both Louis and Niall out of whatever trance they’d fallen into.

“Come on, Haz, don’t waste his time.” Although the words Louis spoke seemed harsh, he delivered them so softly that Niall found them rather comforting.

“No, no, Louis, it’s fine. It might help to hear what you guys have been thinking.” Niall interjected. “Go on, Harry, what’s your theory?”

“Well, there’s this particular fan that is really obsessed with Liam. I mean, she really puts the fan in fanatic!” Harry began. Niall locked his phone screen so he could completely focus on the men before him. “We see her pretty much everywhere we go, she tweets him nonstop, shows up outside his parents’ house, and even once at his own house. Liam had to move house because of her!”

“So what makes you think she chose to kidnap him now?”

“Well, Liam was in the process of getting a restraining order against her. He was desperate to get some privacy.” Niall hummed, taking in what Harry just said.

“Okay.” Niall nodded. “Louis, have you got any theories?”

“Yeah, I do.” Louis sat up straighter, preparing to spill all to Niall. “I don’t agree with Harry, I don’t think it could be her.”

“Why not?” Niall pushed, hoping to get the most out of the two men as he could.

“Come on, you’ve seen the video. And Harry,” Louis turned slightly towards Harry, “you’ve seen this girl. There’s no way they’re the same person. I’m one hundred percent sure that the person in the video with Liam is a man.”

“I agree with you, Louis. That’s something my whole team agrees on. I doubt many women have voices as deep as that for one thing.” Niall explained.

“I don’t doubt that it’s a bloke.” Harry interjected.

“So what’s your thinking there then, Haz?” Louis asked.

“Well, maybe it’s the girl’s dad, or uncle or something like that. They might’ve heard about the restraining order and got angry about it.” 

“That’s an idea, Harry.” Niall said in approval. “Louis, anything to add?”

“I still don’t think it’s her. I think it’s someone Liam knows personally.”

“Why do you think that?”

“I’m not sure. Everything just feels quite personal about this. I can’t tell you why I think that. Maybe it’s the way the guy speaks to Liam in the video. Almost as if they know each other.”

“So you think possibly Liam knows who it is as well, despite the fact he wore a mask?”

“Yeah, I think so.”

“These are some really good ideas guys, really helpful. I don’t know if you realise how refreshing it is to hear someone else’s point of view.” Niall loved the new fresh ideas, cleaning up his old, dampening ones. “Do you have the name of this stalker?”

“I know her Twitter name.” Harry offered.

“I think Liam’s bodyguard might know her name.” Louis suggested.

“Alright, perfect.”

“Do you agree with Harry then?” Louis asked.

“Not necessarily, but she could be useful. If she isn’t involved then she may have seen something.” Niall felt rather revitalised; Harry and Louis providing him with a second wind of sorts.

***

Niall had his team track down Liam’s stalker, a girl by the name of Lucy Watson. Niall had Scott interview her whilst he went to Birmingham for a while to check on the warehouse. He wanted to see if his team had discovered anything of use. They still had to wait a few days for any DNA to be analysed, but Niall couldn’t see much use in just sitting around in his office.

Upon arrival Niall was taken back downstairs, near where Liam was found originally. He was lead into one of the rooms down there. The room wasn’t too big, slightly smaller than the one Liam had been kept in. Inside Niall saw the remains of what must’ve been the control room of sorts. There were pieces of computers scattered around the room like debris after an explosion. It was then that his phone began to ring.

“Hello?” Niall wasn’t sure why he always said ‘hello’ as a question when his phone had caller ID. He knew Scott was on the other end.

“Hey Nialler, how’s it going buddy?” Scott sounded rather cheerful, which gave Niall an ounce of hope for some good news.

“You should see the room I’m in Scott. They must’ve known we were coming.”

“Why do you say that?”

“They must’ve had a ton of computers controlling the stream of Payne in this one room, and they’re all smashed to bits.”

“Jesus, really?”

“Hmmm.”

“How’d they know we were coming?”

“No clue, but we need to find that out. We need to make sure they don’t stay one step ahead of us this whole time.” Niall couldn’t see him, but he knew Scott was nodding. “How’d the interview with Lucy Watson go?”

“The name ‘Watson’ fits her well. She’s a proper Sherlock Holmes, Ni.”

“How can the name ‘Watson’ fit her if she’s like Sherlock Holmes, Scott? They’re two different people.” Niall teased.

“Shut up, smartarse, you know what I mean.” Niall could imagine him rolling his eyes now. “Anyway, she knows pretty much everything there is to know about the Payne lad. I think if you quizzed her and his own mum, she’d win. It was a bit weird really.”

“Did she know anything about Liam’s kidnapping?”

“No, and she had a solid alibi if you’re thinking of her as a suspect. She was at a court hearing here in London about the restraining order Payne was filing, and she and her mum were staying overnight in one of the 'Premier Inns' here.”

“So she didn’t even see anything at Liam’s house?”

“No, she was in London all day, never had a chance to go and visit.”

“Does she have any male family members? You only mentioned her mum.”

“Only family she has is her mum and her mum’s sister. No uncles, brothers or grandfathers. Never knew her dad. Girl’s got some serious daddy issues, Nialler. Reckon she’s projecting them on her beloved Payne.”

“True psychologist, you are Scott.” Niall joked.

“What can I say? You’ve taught me well.” Niall could hear the smile in Scott’s voice.

“So she’s neither a suspect nor a witness then.”

“No.” Scott agreed. “I have some good news though.”

“What?”

“A nurse from Heartlands hospital called for you on your office phone. Wanted to tell you Payne was out of surgery. He’s not fit to travel, but seeing as you’re up in Birmingham anyway, they said you could go and visit him.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi, firstly let me apologise for the mad delay in updates. I had my A levels so I was busy revising for the past couple months, but now it's summer and I'm free, so hopefully I can get a couple more updates in quicker before September (but from the way my A levels went doesn't seem like I'm gonna get into uni next year anyway lmao).  
> Secondly, thank you very much for reading. Huge thanks as always to the people commenting, bookmarking and giving kudos - your feedback is really helpful in letting me know how it's going.  
> Thanks again, let us know what you think! :)


	10. “Oh, look at this Nialler, he speaks!”

Niall rushed over to Heartlands hospital right after ending the phone call with Scott, not wanting to leave Liam alone for too long. It didn't take him too long to get there, thankfully, and he had to take a moment to stop himself just sprinting right into the hospital. He found Liam in the room Scott had told him he was in, and knocked lightly on the door before entering. Liam had been given a private room for obvious reasons. Upon opening the door Niall saw Liam in the bed, being spoken to quietly by a nurse. His left arm was in a cast and he had various bandages, stitches and bruises scattered about his body. There was also a mask covering his mouth and nose that Niall assumed was for oxygen. Niall closed the door quietly as he watched the nurse place what he recognised as an oxygen monitor on Liam’s finger. She then moved to the arm without the cast on it and proceeded to check his blood pressure, glancing up as she did so and noticed Niall stood by the door.

“Oh, hello.” She exclaimed, a little shocked.

“Hi ma’am, I’m Niall Horan, detective in charge of Mr. Payne’s case.” Niall explained, giving the woman a small smile. He saw Liam turn his head slightly to look at Niall too.

“Ahh, I see. Come on in then, Detective. I’m just doing some checks.”

“Hi Liam.” Niall acknowledged the other man for the first time. Liam turned his head so he was no longer looking at Niall, ignoring him. “How are you feeling?” Liam continued to stare blankly ahead. Niall realising he wouldn’t get a response then decided to direct his questions to the nurse instead. “Ma’am, could we talk outside?”

“Yes, of course.”

Niall opened the door for the nurse and followed her into the corridor.

“How’s he doing?”

“Well, as you’ve just seen he’s been quite unresponsive. We know he can hear us, and see us, and he has spoken a little bit. We’ve also heard him shouting a lot in his sleep.” Niall grimaced hearing that. 

“How’s he doing injury-wise?”

“He has a broken arm, as I’m sure you noticed. He also has 2 fractured ribs, some internal bleeding, and a broken nose. That’s why he has an oxygen mask on; the fractured nose and ribs was giving him some difficulty breathing.” Niall nodded along to the nurse’s words.

“Okay, thanks. Could you get me a copy of his file so I can have one at my office, please?”

“Yes, of course, Detective.”

“Am I okay to sit and chat with him?”

“By all means.”

“Thank you, ma’am.”

The nurse smiled at Niall as she walked away down the corridor and Niall re-entered Liam’s room. He sat down next to the man’s bed; Liam still ignoring Niall’s presence.

“Hi Liam, do you remember who I am?” Niall spoke softly to him. When Liam continued to ignore him, he decided to continue anyway. “I’m Detective Niall Horan; I’m the one that found you in that warehouse. I cut you from the chair, and we sat and spoke for a while whilst my team cleared the warehouse.” He received nothing more than a cough in response. “Liam, I’m sorry, I’m sure you’d much rather be visited by your family right now, but I told them all I wanted to be the first to speak to you when you woke up. I need to hear everything from your point of view, and then you can see them.” Liam shuffled as much as he could without hurting himself to position his body away from Niall. “Look Liam, I can clearly see you don’t want to talk, but the longer you give me the silent treatment, the longer it’ll be until you can see your family.” Niall sighed in exasperation. “It’ll also mean the longer you have to have police escorts everywhere. You’re in our protection from here on until we lock up whoever did this to you.”

“Don’t need protection.” Liam mumbled, only just loud enough for Niall to hear. He sat up abruptly in his seat at the sound of Liam’s voice.

“Liam, whilst they’re still out there you’re still at risk.” Niall explained.

“M’fine. They won’t come back.” Niall scratched his head in bewilderment.

“Liam, do you know who did this to you?”

“No.”

“Are you sure?” Liam didn’t answer, shutting himself off from Niall again. Niall wanted to scream. He thought he was finally getting somewhere but Liam’s refusal to talk meant he’d be here forever. His phone buzzed in his pocket with a message from Scott telling him he was on his way up to meet Niall. Niall hoped perhaps Scott would provide some assistance in this matter.

***

Scott arrived a few hours later, walking into Liam’s hospital room without knocking. There he found Niall with his head in his hands, sat next to Liam who lay in the hospital bed, staring blankly ahead.

“Nialler?” Niall’s head shot up at the sound of his voice.

“Thank god you’re here.” Niall stood up and gestured to Scott to follow him into the corridor. “Liam’s refusing to talk. The most I’ve got out of him is that he doesn’t want protection because he doesn’t think they’ll try and hurt him again.”

“Does Liam know who they are then?”

“That’s what I asked him, and he told me no and then hasn’t spoken a word since.”

“Jesus.” Scott ran a hand through his hair, pushing it off his forehead. “Are we calling bullshit on that?”

“Well, I’m not too sure if he’s telling the truth or not, so maybe.” Niall shrugged. “Do you want to see if you can help me at all?”

“Yeah, let’s go.”

The two men re-entered the room and sat either side of Liam’s bed.

“Liam, this is Scott Matthews, my right-hand man in your case, and every case for that matter.” Niall gestured to Scott, and he watched Liam’s dark eyes flick over to the man in question.

“Alright, Payne, tell us what you remember then.” Niall would’ve cringed at Scott’s abruptness if he wasn’t so used to it by now. Liam sighed in response, still not talking. Scott looked up at Niall, who gave him a look to say, “see what I mean?”. “Can you tell us anything about who took you? Was it a man or a woman? Were there multiple people involved?” Scott already knew the person in the video was a man, and Niall’s team had concluded there were probably multiple people involved, so these weren’t vital questions; but the two men were going to try anything to get Liam to talk.

***

Niall and Scott spent another two hours asking Liam questions and receiving no answers before Scott got angry.

“Look, Payne, Niall here will give you all the sympathy bullshit in the world, and if it was up to him he’d wait years for you to open your damn mouth. Me on the other hand, I couldn’t give two shits! Whoever kidnapped you is still out there; dangerous criminals are still fucking out there! For all we know they could be planning out a new victim right now, getting ready to hurt someone else, who may not end up as lucky as you! The least you could do is answer some of our fucking questions!” Niall did cringe this time, slumping down in his chair, holding his head in his hand. Niall wasn’t the type to blow up like Scott was, but he knew how Scott was feeling. It was absolutely agonising questioning a man who refused to speak for hours on end when he was already lacking energy anyway.

“Fuck you.” Liam muttered.

“Oh, look at this Nialler, he speaks!” Scott had been stood up and pacing during his rant, and had now stopped back over by Liam’s bed, arms in the air exaggeratedly. Liam turned his body in response to face away from Scott, and Niall could see the pain in his face as he turned towards him. Liam’s brown eyes met Niall’s blue, and Niall’s stomach felt heavy with guilt.

“Scott, why don’t you take a little break? Get something to eat, go for a walk or something?” Niall suggested.

“Gladly.” Scott shook his head as he left the room, leaving Niall and Liam alone.

“I’m sorry about him, he’s not the best at hiding his emotions.” Liam didn’t respond, but his eyes didn’t leave Niall’s. “Look Liam, I don’t want to have to do this to you, but if you know something and keep refusing to tell us, we could have you convicted for obstruction of justice.” Niall really hated himself for saying that. Liam had just been kidnapped and beaten for days on end, for Niall to then be threatening him with that.

“I just want to see my family. Please.” Niall tried very hard to swallow the lump in his throat when he saw the pleading look in Liam’s eyes.

“I need to get your statement first.” Niall was slightly glad about Scott’s outburst, as it reminded Niall that he couldn’t always be too soft with people. He realised he would have to be firm with Liam if he was going to get anything done.

“Fine.” Liam sighed in defeat. “What do you want me to say?”

“Can you describe what happened the night you were taken?”

“I can’t remember a lot if I’m completely honest with you but…” He trailed off and Niall saw his face scrunch up as if he was thinking hard. “I just remember something being taped over my mouth and nose, like a soggy cloth or something. I think something was put over my head too.”

“Where were you when this happened?”

“I think I was in my living room. I was about to sit and watch some telly for a bit.”

“Do you remember if the cloth smelt strongly or made you feel anything?”

“It didn’t have a strong smell or anything.” Liam squinted a bit, not looking at Niall. “You know the type of thing you’d clean your loo with? Smelt a bit like that.”

“So like disinfectant?” Liam nodded in response to Niall’s question.

“Yeah, yeah like that. I remember having a headache, like a proper banging one. My head felt really heavy like I’d been clonked on it, but I don’t remember being hit.”

“From what you’ve described, it seems like the rag had chloroform on it.” Niall informed the other man.

“But I didn’t pass out or anything straight away.” Liam interjected. “I had something put over my head and I think I was led out of the house then and… I think that’s all I remember before I woke up tied to that chair.”

“Well, unlike shown in television or films, chloroform actually takes around five minutes to actually knock you out, which explains why you didn’t pass out straight away.”

“Oh, right.” Liam nodded in understanding. 

“Do you remember hearing any voices, any that might sound familiar to you maybe? Or maybe even remember if the voices sounded female or male?”

“I don’t really remember much, but I don’t remember hearing any women or anything.” Liam still wasn’t looking at Niall, and it seemed as though he was looking more to the opposite direction than before. 

Niall knew Liam wasn’t going to be his most receptive self at this point in time, especially seeing as he hadn’t seen his family or friends yet and Niall was the one preventing that. He didn’t really think he would get much more from him if he kept pressing him right now.

“Okay Liam. I think we’ll leave this initial interview for now.” Liam finally turned his head to Niall now.

“Can I see my family now?” His eyes were brimming with hope.

“Yeah, yeah I’ll send them in as I leave now.” Niall stood up to leave. “Thanks Liam, I’ll see you soon.” He exited the hospital room, aware of Liam’s watchful eyes following him. 

Niall re-entered the waiting room and saw both Scott and Liam’s family look quickly at him. He gave his expectant family the nod of approval they’d been waiting forever for and watched them hurriedly enter his room.

“You’re letting them see him now?” Scott questioned.

“Yeah, well, I wasn’t getting loads out of him and I don’t think stopping them seeing him would do any good.”

“Anything useful?”

“No, he just basically described the stereotypical chloroform-soaked rag and bag or something over his head.”

“Nothing else?”

Niall shook his head. “Said he doesn’t remember much, but that there probably weren’t any women around.”

“Believe him?”

“I don’t see any reason not to at the moment.” Niall shrugged.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi there. I know this chapter is a bit rubbish, I'm not too happy with it, so firstly let me apologise for the quality of this.
> 
> Secondly, I am so so sorry it's been forever since I've updated. I'm sure it's understandable that I will of lost some readers because of how long it's been. I started uni in September and have just been so busy with my first year, work wise and socially wise that I just haven't had the time. I feel terrible it's been so long. This is my first chaptered story I've written that I really promised myself I'd finish so I don't care how long it takes I want to get this done.
> 
> Anyway thank you for reading.
> 
> Also, finally, in the time I was gone this fic reached 1000 hits and I'm just amazed and so thankful, big love guys x


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